Brigade of the Americal Division, to search and destroy My Lai. My Lai is a small village located on the coast of Vietnam, near the South China Sea. Lt. William Calley led 150 fully armed and ready soldiers into Son My villiage to destory the hamlet called My Lia. But it wasn’t clear as what to do with any civilians they encountered(The My Lai Massacre).The Charlie Company soldiers were brought by helicopter (Gettleman). The soldiers entered My Lai expecting fierce combat with a Viet Cong battalion believed to be at My Lai. “For the past three months the American unit had been in no major battles but had suffered a lot of casualties from snipers, mines, and booby traps. The soldiers were ready to prove themselves, ready to exact revenge on the enemy”(The My Lai Massacre). The Charlie Company soldiers met no Viet Cong soldiers though. Then William Calley ordered the slaughter of the civilians of My Lai. This should have never happened just because you don’t find the enemy doesn’t give you the right to kill the villagers. Also the inhumane way they killed these villagers which were mostly elderly woman and men and children. The following is a few of the ways they killed the villagers According to eyewitness reports offered after the event, several old men were bayoneted and praying women and children were shot in the back of the head, and at least one girl was raped, and then killed. For his part, Calley was said to have rounded up a group of the villagers, ordered them into a ditch, and mowed them down in a fury of machine gun fire. (Vietnam Online)Also “when Calley spotted a baby crawling away from a ditch, he grabbed her, threw her back into the ditch, and opened fire”(The My Lai Massacre). In some of the ditches the bodies laid five feet deep. One soldier would later say, You didn’t have to look for people to kill, they were just there. I cut their throats, ...
